


Saturday Is Haircut Day

by Nemhaine42



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Not Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie) Compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-09
Updated: 2015-05-09
Packaged: 2018-03-29 17:30:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3904822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nemhaine42/pseuds/Nemhaine42
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'Laugardagr' is just the Asgardian word for Saturday, it turns out. But it's also Haircut Day, for Bucky and Darcy too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Saturday Is Haircut Day

The bus dropped them in the centre of a tiny, dusty town in the middle of the New Mexico desert. The sign on the road in had read ‘Puente Antiguo’ but Bucky had never heard of it. There didn’t seem to be much there, a few shops, a bar, a cafe and an old car showroom at the other end of the main street that looked like it was being repurposed. He couldn’t guess why on earth Steve had taken him here. Well, Steve had said it would be good to get some air and a change of scenery. Away from the noise and jostling of New York, somewhere they could both clear their heads and have some peace and quiet. Steve had pre-arranged with his friend Thor - which was a sentence Bucky had never thought he’d hear - to come and stay at the research station currently inhabited by their astrophysics team. Bucky just hadn’t realised that it would be _here_.

“We’re a little early. He said he’d meet us at… Izzy’s?” Steve said. A short process of elimination had them sitting in the cafe halfway down Main Street, where they drew a few stares and whispers. Both of them were unkempt from being on the road for a while, but Bucky was worse. At least Steve wasn’t wearing borrowed sweatpants and a hoodie. Having only shaved intermittently and with no memory whatsoever of the last time his hair had been cut, Bucky probably looked like he’d been kicked off a freight train.

Eventually the door opened to a large blond man, wearing a plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled to the elbows and paint-speckled jeans. But for the shoulder length hair, and the fact that he was a head taller than everyone else in town, he might have passed for a regular guy. He spotted the pair of them and strode over to wrap Steve in a bear hug. Introductions were made, hands were shaken, and though the curious stares did not dissipate, the locals seemed to feel that if they were with Thor they were best left in peace.

They grabbed their bags and Thor lead them back up the street, towards the showroom. Steve chatted away with Thor, and Bucky listened. By the look of him Thor was the one doing the remodelling, with sawdust in his hair and little half-healed nicks on his hands. He told them Stark had bought the property outright for the team to use as their base, so there was money to make the place more livable and kit it out properly. Stark had probably imagined at least some of the money would go to paying people to carry out such work, rather than one burly Asgardian but Thor seemed to view it as a mark of pride to build their house himself.

“We have set up a spare room for the both of you. I hope you do not mind sharing,” Thor said.

“I’ll live,” Bucky teased as they crossed the road to reach the lab. It was obvious through the large windows that the kitchen was the current project. Several appliances were waiting to be installed and the units had been stripped out altogether, with the largest wall freshly painted. Bucky could see materials meant for other parts of the building - lab equipment, office furniture - and wondered if half the reason they’d been allowed to stay was for Thor to rope them into helping. Not that he’d mind, it felt far better to be occupied rather than sedentary with random memories shaking themselves loose.

“Just please tell me you’ve done the bathroom already. We could both use a good wash and a shave,” Steve said, looking back at Bucky, “And a haircut.”

“Your timing is fortuitous: yes, the bathroom is complete. And tomorrow is Laugardagr, Darcy will sort you both out,” Thor announced, clapping a confused Steve on the shoulder.

So Steve and Bucky were introduced to the saga of Haircut Day, the team’s solution to the fact that Puente Antiguo only had one barber, and it only knew one style. Although one which would not have been unfamiliar to two 1940s’ army recruits, anyone who wanted something different was forced to drive several towns over and pay double for the privilege. Even with new Stark Industries funding, the team was still budget-conscious, so when Erik had started to look like he might get moved on from store fronts Darcy had begun the tradition of giving them all haircuts once every few weeks.

Darcy, they soon learned, was a small, curvy, young woman whose job boiled down to mothering the team, including Thor. They were introduced to her, and to Jane Foster and Erik Selvig, and given a thorough tour of the research station’s home improvements. The lab portion of the building was significant, the old front showroom lined with powerful computers and backup generators as well as an enormous satellite dish that was waiting to be installed on the roof. Jane explained how eventually they would barely need to leave their little outpost at all but, for now, they were still going out on night-time jaunts in their van. Darcy whispered to him that any odd noises in the early hours would be them and that he should not freak out about it.

As he’d seen from outside, the kitchen was a wreck. Thor delicately ran his hands over the new paint to see how it was drying. Under a dust sheet there were parts for new units, and Thor lamented that the new dining furniture would not arrive for two more days, else he would be finished much sooner and they would no longer have to crowd around a plastic fold-out table for every meal. Bucky was pretty sure that so long as there was a meal on it, the table didn’t matter.

On a scale of one to ten, the bathroom had been cranked up to eleven. The large bath was set into hand-quarried rock, more of a hot tub than anything else. There were stone tiles, with underfloor heating, and brass fittings gleamed in the light. It was a fancy-ass bathroom, and all of it was Thor’s doing. Apparently Asgardians were big on baths. _“It’s a Viking thing,”_ Darcy had said.

The bedrooms were equally well-appointed, as demonstrated when Thor threw the door to his and Jane’s wide open. It revealed a large bed, soft carpet, art on the walls, and several of Jane’s bras littering the floor. Thor quickly shut the door again and hurried them along to the guest room.

He and Steve were quartered upstairs in what was to become an office. It had been repainted and recarpeted, there was a large printer in one corner and phone line sockets in various places along the skirting board. Which Bucky initially catalogued as ‘useful’ until he reminded himself that monitoring the phone lines was not necessary. Not anymore. This wasn’t a mission stop-over, or even army barracks, it was just a place to sleep and leave his few belongings. The only person he had to check in with in any way was Steve, and he was a few feet away on the other camp-bed.

Darcy made mac and cheese for dinner, in mammoth proportion. Between two soldiers and a god, as well as the three normal humans, it disappeared rapidly. The girls packed up all sorts of notes and detectors and departed in their van out into the desert for the night, leaving simply a broad instruction for the boys to behave themselves. This, Thor interpreted as ‘take them to the bar.’

Being a Friday night, it was crowded and, since Bucky was no tidier-looking than he had been in the cafe, the whispers and pointing began anew. The noise was smothering and Thor steered them to some outdoor seating; several picnic benches were lined up out back with sun-faded parasols and fairy lights. Thor treated them to several enormous glasses of beer, which had little effect on Bucky and none whatsoever on Steve or Thor. Only Erik showed any obvious restraint, having ‘learnt his lesson about drinking with a god.’ For a few hours, they drank their fill and told stories and Bucky had a vague recollection of a different bar - a great distance away and long ago - where he’d not looked his best and sat quietly while other people made a rowdy noise. But he couldn’t focus on anything concrete beyond the colour red and not being as drunk as he wanted, so he said nothing. When their table was covered entirely in empty bottles and glasses, and plates which once held nachos, they started their way back home. The girls were still out so the house was cold and quiet. Erik was snoring before his head hit the pillow and Thor didn’t linger; the sound of him tripping over something and muttering, _“damned underthings”_ was heard, before he tipped himself into bed too.

Bucky slept fitfully, waking tensely in the middle of the night to the unfamiliar room. He heard thuds from outside and sat bolt upright, but the hyper-awareness was cut short by Steve snorting loudly in his sleep. After a few deep breaths Bucky recognised Darcy and Jane’s voices as they dragged themselves back in from a night under the stars, just like they’d warned.

Bucky laid back, determined to get a few more hours. His eyes felt heavy in their sockets and he wished his heart would stop beating so loudly so he could sleep. Instead he focused on the sounds of the girls shuffling around and getting to bed. Jane seemed to do little more than kick off her boots and flop down on the bed, from what he could hear. But Darcy had a routine, washing her face and brushing her teeth before settling into bed to read. The walls were thin, and Darcy’s room was on the other side of theirs. The flicks of the pages were like a drawn out metronome and Bucky fell asleep waiting in between each one.

He still woke early though, and Steve followed within minutes. Rogers was disgustingly cheerful first thing in the morning and, though he couldn’t remember as such, Bucky had a feeling that it had always been this way. Steve chirruped a good morning to Thor, who was whisking up a large amount of eggs, and Bucky scowled at a spot on the kitchen table until Darcy slumped down to make everyone coffee.  As the eggs cooked, and the smell wafted up the stairs, the rest of their contingent appeared. Jane was just as irascible without caffeine as her assistant and Erik was bright-eyed, if quiet.

Erik, Steve said, was far more lucid than when he’d last seen the man after the Battle of New York. Much more focused and driven, like he had been before according to Thor. But he still had the air of a man who no longer put much stock in a professional appearance, with uneven stubble, messy hair, and an odd preference for shorts. He and Bucky made quite the scruffy sight at the breakfast table. Darcy took one look at them and pronounced, “Wow, I got my work cut out for me today, huh?”

Bucky might have felt something resembling a smile on his face.

Jane went first. All she was getting was the split ends trimmed off and then she bustled around in the lab, sorting through the initial data that had been brought back in the night. Erik needed a little more than that. His hair got washed and trimmed but he also got a shave. Both Bucky and Steve cocked their heads at the sight of an old-fashioned safety razor, rather than a modern one. Bucky was impressed by how gentle Darcy was. He hadn’t thought Selvig particularly frail, a bit traumatised perhaps but there were fewer people in the building who weren’t. Even so, Darcy’s touches were soft and light, and Bucky was looking forward to having those on him instead.

But it was Thor’s turn, who sat in the kitchen chair that had been dragged through as if all his birthdays had come at once. Darcy called him a big lug and accused him of deliberately putting off grooming his beard, just so he could sit and have her fix it. ‘Laugardagr’ was just the Asgardian word for Saturday, it was explained, but a day on which it was traditional for people - couples, families and friends alike - to go to a public bath, or get their hair done or their nails cleaned or whatever took their fancy. This was Thor making himself at home.

It was surprisingly relaxing, watching Darcy work. There was a clear and basic process which was repeated, methodical and practised. Bucky knew this was how hair was cut, but he did not remember ever having it done. He remembered having short hair before.  It must have been cut at some point, since the ends only came to his shoulders and not his knees. The memories of it were just gone, along with countless others. He wasn’t going to mention it.

“So, where’d you learn to do this stuff?” Steve asked, while Darcy combed out Thor’s hair. She checked the length, trimmed off the tips, and measured again. All while Thor relaxed with a lazy smile and his eyes shut, stretched out like an enormous dog.

“The hair I learned in college, mostly out of necessity,” she answered, not taking her eyes off her work, “The shaving, well… Erik bought the razor from an antique store in London, a few online tutorials later and here we are.”

After Thor was towel-dried and sent on his way, Steve sat in the chair and began gesturing ineffectually about how he wanted his hair. He gave up mid-sentence and asked for something “like Clint’s.” Darcy nodded knowingly. Steve had shaved before breakfast, not realising Darcy would happily oblige, and he was regretting it and severely failing to hide it. But it also meant that Steve’s turn didn’t last all that long and, before Bucky knew what was happening, both Steve and Darcy were looking at him expectantly. Watching Darcy neaten everyone up had been relaxing but he’d spared not a single thought to what _he_ wanted.

“You don’t have to get it cut, Buck,” Steve said, “I just thought it was annoying you.”

“It is,” Bucky said snappishly, “It’s too long. But I don’t want it short either, too exposed.”

“You don’t need to hide behind it. I mean, I doubt anyone’s gonna recognise us out here,” Steve offered.

Bucky glared at him through the offending bangs of hair, trying to convey that was definitely not what he meant by ‘exposed.’ Anyone who was actually looking for him would have the arm as a bit of a giveaway, rather than his stupid face. He just wasn’t ready to look like his old self yet. But the length of his hair was irritating him, so he had to compromise somewhere.

“Okay, so…?” Darcy asked, trying to bring the boys out of the tension they were creating in this little bathroom, “You want a lot of the length off, but not as short as Steve’s. I can do that.”

The next hurdle was actually getting Bucky to sit still for Darcy to do it. He was twitchy as he moved to sit down. He told himself to suck it up; this chair was nothing like the one Hydra had used to keep him compliant, it was clearly nothing more than a wooden chair up against a sink.

He let out a deep breath as he sat down, but he grit his teeth and his shoulders became tenser and tighter when Darcy had him lean back and tip his head back. The moment he felt the water run on his scalp it was too much and he shot straight back up again. He even went so far as to tuck himself in a corner and stand there with the heels of his hands pressing into his eyes. He felt so fucking stupid. He _knew_ there was no reason to be on edge. Darcy had no reason to want to hurt him, and could hardly do it with warm water and a plastic comb. He’d sat and watched as she performed perfectly innocent grooming on four other people before him with no problem. Thor even approached the occasion as a sort of luxurious treat. But something in Bucky’s brain screamed at him that sitting back in a chair with someone else behind the controls would be painful and he could not do it.

He heard the faucet squeak as the water was turned off and took several deep, steadying breaths. He dragged his hands down his face and opened his eyes to see Steve standing cautiously between him and Darcy, who was still and nervous.

“Sorry,” Bucky mumbled.

“S’not your fault, Buck. You don’t have to do it if you don’t want,” Steve said, “you gonna be okay?”

“I _want_ to do it, I just… ugh,” he groaned and fisted his hair, half wanting to just rip it out by the roots.

“You can stand up…” Darcy said, shyer than before, unsure of how he would react, “if you wet your hair yourself, I can stand on the chair and cut it instead.”

Desperate for any excuse not to sit, Bucky stuck his head in the sink and ran the faucet, relieved that the water was warm and not ice cold. He shook his hands through his hair roughly, and felt dainty hands tuck a towel around his neck. There was the scrape of the chair on the floor and suddenly little Darcy was a foot taller than him. He stood up straight and focused on taking deep breaths.

“So I was thinking I’d cut it short at the back,” Darcy said, “and leave you longer bangs in the front?”

She was obviously waiting for a yes or no but Bucky still had no idea what he wanted, and only vague hints of what he didn’t want. He opened and closed his mouth, as if the movement would jump start a sentence, and looked at Darcy from the corner of his eye. He found her with a gentle, knowing expression that filled him with relief that he wouldn’t have to explain his entire sense of ‘I don’t know.’

Darcy held two fingers up against his hair, at jaw level, “here?”

He shook his head no. Her fingers were damp and cool from working with water and shampoo all morning, but he liked the feeling of being touched.

“Here?” she asked again, this time just below his cheekbone. That was better but still a little long. He finally gave a little nod when she moved her fingers up another inch to the top of his cheekbone. Darcy smiled and held her hand out to the side, “Okay, then. Scalpel, nurse.”

Bucky’s mouth twitched into a smile at Steve being addressed that way and the words were out before he could even work out what they were going to be, “doing your ma proud, punk.”

There was nothing but silence and the snipping of scissors at his hair and he wondered if he was wrong. Steve’s mother _had_ been a nurse. He didn’t remember, he just knew. He waited a few seconds more for Steve to say something, anything, for Bucky to know he was right before he looked around to see Steve looking at him, not a little bit choked up.

“Your ma _was_ a nurse, right?”

“Yeah, she was, Buck.”

Steve did not press the memory further, having learned by now that they tended to happen in isolation and not chain reactions, and Darcy trimmed away. It felt strange to have air on the back of his neck again but it also felt lighter, like the weight being lifted from him was not just that of his hair.

She tried her best to reach around but the far right side of his hair was beyond her grasp. As Darcy leaned her weight forward, the chair tipped up onto two of its legs. The comb and scissors clattered to the floor and her hands instantly grabbed hold of Bucky’s shoulders to steady herself, letting out a short squeak.

“You okay, Darcy?” Steve asked.

She answered yes but didn’t not look at Steve, instead staring down at where her hand met the metal on his shoulder. Bucky then realised his hand - the metal one - was curled around Darcy’s hip, keeping her from falling. Something underneath the metal felt tense and bizarrely familiar, something that had not been used in a long time. The arm was just an arm, a prosthetic extension that happened to move like any other limb, but it had been used for so many years as a weapon for harm and destruction that, now, using it like he would have used his real arm felt taboo. He wasn’t supposed to use it for mundane things like shaving, scratching his chin, or gently touching a woman. He wanted to retract it but also didn’t.

Darcy leaned her weight away from him and stood firmly on the chair again but did not take her hands from his shoulders. Steve bent down to retrieve the comb and scissors and held them out to her, and she had to let go of Bucky to take them. He was filled with an urge to tell Steve to get lost but swallowed it.

“You think you could turn around, so I can cut the other side?” Darcy asked.

Bucky did so wordlessly, now facing Steve rather than the mirror. The others had cleared out and gotten other jobs started after Darcy had finished with them, but Steve had stayed. Bucky hadn’t minded at first but it was a little awkward with Steve looking at him rather intently, and Bucky having nothing to look at but Steve or the door to the linen cupboard.

Darcy’s fingers picked and tweaked at his bangs, positioning little sections just right. She gave a short nod when she deemed him passable and with a flip of her hair she said, “pretty cute, if I do say so myself. You want me to take the face fuzz off too, or you wanna do that yourself?”

“Pretty sure I’ve been waiting all morning for you to do it, sweetheart,” he replied, with absolutely no idea where it came from but it wasn’t a single word of a lie. He saw Steve smirking out of the corner of his eye.

“Okay then, smartass,” she said, with no bite whatsoever, and gently grabbed his chin to turn him to face her. She started applying lather to his face and Bucky wasn’t sure if it was better to be looking at someone other that Steve, or worse to be watching Darcy up-close. He took in the shape of her nose, the droplets of water on her glasses, and the curve of her bottom lip. From the way her eyes kept flicking up to his, he knew she felt him staring but they both carried on regardless.

Her touches were just as delicate on Bucky as they had been on Erik, and over far too soon. He smiled at her as she towelled off the stray spots of lather and ran the back of her finger over his now smooth jaw.

“Okay. Fit for duty, soldier,” she said, warmly, “You two get out from under my feet, I’m sure Thor has some jobs for you.”

Darcy hopped down from her chair and Bucky noticed the barest hint of a blush appearing on her cheeks as she tidied the bathroom. He waited until Steve had a head start and hovered in the doorway.

“Thanks, Darcy,” he said with a smile.

Just as Darcy had predicted, Thor had a number of pending tasks waiting for them. A new refrigerator needed hauled into place, as well as units with sharp edges to be sanded down. Laminate flooring to be put in, plastering up holes and cracks in the walls, painting, a new door put on Erik’s room. Bucky couldn’t help but wonder if this was actually what Steve had had in mind in coming out here, but it was hardly taxing or tortuous and came with Darcy cooking them up burgers at the end of it.

The day after they were asked to help Thor put the giant satellite dish on the roof. Not so much in the ‘I don’t understand your Midgardian satellite’ way but in a ‘hold this while I hook up all the connections’ kind of way. So Steve passed Thor cables while Bucky stood with his arm holding up the heavy dish. The sun beat down on them and Bucky felt the skin on the back of his neck, now exposed, stinging as it burned a little. There was an odd little twinge in his metal arm as he held the dish up, he wasn’t pushing or pulling and, although it was heavy, the weight didn’t require great strain. It was the same kind of normal that he’d felt when the arm had held Darcy.

There was a low thumping of muffled music and the crunch of tyres in the gravel as Darcy and Jane pulled up in the van, returning from their supply trip to Roswell. Thor fixed the final bolt in place and they all stood back from the dish to let it stand. Just as Bucky turned to glance down at the girls, he saw Darcy leaning out of the van window pointing her phone at them.

“It’s evidence!” she hollered, “I’m pretty sure you guys are going to cause a traffic accident, and the cops are going to want to know why.”

All three men paused to look at each other, sweaty and wearing rather greasy tank tops, and realised a bit too late that they were probably visible even from the other end of the tiny town. Jane muttered something about being in Izzy’s good books now. Steve coughed and asked Thor if they were done on the roof yet. They were.

Back on ground level, they were just in time to help the girls put away all the groceries; they’d bought a lot more to celebrate the newer, bigger fridge. Jane insisted on actually filling the fridge herself, putting packets of food in certain places depending on the type of food, the size and dimensions. When all the heavy cases of soda were stored, and the things that lived on high shelves were hefted up, Bucky thought to make himself scarce. The two women had a buzz of activity to them when they worked together, even just unpacking shopping, and it didn’t seem helpful to be getting in their way. He turned to head up the stairs when Darcy caught him by surprise by thrusting a large, weighty shopping bag at him.

“So I bought you some clothes so you won’t look like such an abandoned puppy, but I might be kinda regretting it now,” Darcy said, her eyes roving up and down his arms, “some of it’s second-hand but I figured you wouldn’t be too prissy about that kind of thing…”

Glancing into the bag, Bucky saw it was jammed full of jeans and sweaters, shirts and socks.

“I can’t pay you back,” he admitted in an embarrassed, muffled voice.

“Pfft! I don’t want you to pay me back,” Darcy replied adamantly, “they’re presents. I just hope I got your size right.”

He smiled a little, mouthed the word ‘thanks’ and made a beeline for his bedroom, taking the steps two at a time. He shut the door perhaps louder than necessary, but hopefully it meant Steve would not immediately follow. Bucky tipped the shopping back out onto his bed; there were two pairs of jeans, a couple of sweaters, brand new socks and underwear, a mix of t-shirts and flannel work shirts, and a faded denim jacket with a thrift store label. She could not have known that he needed underwear and he suspected Steve must have mentioned to her before she and Jane had gone to town. A tiny part of him started to bristle at the charity, but he ignored it in favour of the part that felt warm and soft thinking Darcy had gone out of her way to buy him clothes he sorely needed. And he was certain it had been a great deal of time since anyone had given him presents.

The clothes he’d arrived in were also the clothes he’d been working in, and they were now beyond filthy. He was filthy. So he grabbed up some of his new wardrobe and commandeered the shiny bathroom before Thor could use up the hot water. The shirts fit well enough, the jeans were a little long but good in the waist. The denim jacket he was going to get really attached to, really quickly. It wasn’t stiff or tight, and had a collar just right for turning up. He did so as a kind of gut reaction, but Steve commented that turning up collars had been Bucky’s thing for years.

Between the clothes and the haircut, he looked practically presentable. So much so that the stares and whispers from the locals in the bar that night were of an entirely different nature. The girls joined them this time, everyone crowding into a circular booth and making a mess of themselves over a large plate of chicken wings. Darcy sat to the left of him and he bravely used that hand to gently wipe a stray drop of bbq sauce from her chin, before licking it from his thumb. The metal tasted a little weird with the sauce, but using the metal arm to touch - affectionate touch - gave him an electric feeling that went up his arm and through his whole body. Steve, he noticed, chose that moment to look away, trying not to smile.

That feeling of using his metal arm, using it for even the smallest thing, wouldn’t leave him alone. Everytime he found himself using the natural arm for anything trivial, anything human, he tried to subtly swap to using the metal one. Drinking coffee had proved a success. Opening cabinets, not so much. He’d ripped a few handles from cupboards before he’d given that one up. Shaving was proving tricky as well. He couldn’t get the pressure right to shave close but not cut his skin, and it was made worse by the modern disposable razors. They were too light and flimsy in his right hand, never mind the left, in which the plastic simply shattered with the slightest amount of force. There was only one left now, other than the one he’d just broken, and he knew Steve had been using them too, so Bucky would be forced to admit why he needed six razors to achieve half a shave. Darcy hadn’t used a plastic one, and Bucky huffed bitterly as he remembered it was from an _antique store._

As if the thought had summoned her, Darcy appeared in the doorway of the bathroom carrying a stack of clean towels. When she saw him she stopped short and offered to leave him in peace, but Bucky waved that off and let her tuck the towels into the cupboard.

“Are you left handed?” she asked, surprised.

“Uh, no.”

“Then how come you’re shaving with your left hand? Or trying, anyway?”

“Need to get used to this one.”

“Why? If you’re right handed…”

“S’not the point,” he grumbled, sighing and setting the splintered plastic down on the sink, “if I don’t use it like I use the other one, it’ll always be _something else.”_

__

“Well, maybe you need to build up to shaving,” Darcy said, picking the last razor out of the pack, “otherwise that pretty face of yours will get sliced off.”

She inspected the razor disdainfully and shoved it back in the pack. She dug around in the cupboard and produced the old metal razor of Erik’s. Rather than go back through for a chair to stand on, Darcy simply hopped up and sat on the edge of the sink unit and started making lather for him.

“Don’t tell Thor,” she said.  About treating him to an extra shave or sitting on the sink, Bucky didn’t know.

He still had to fess up to Steve about breaking all their razors. And, to Steve’s eternal credit, he did not complain or even laugh. He just smiled, told Bucky “ _no worries,_ ” and walked down to the corner store to get several more packs.

Bucky gave up using his left hand for shaving after that, there were some things the prosthetic just wasn’t meant for. But the plastic disposable razors still felt feeble and ineffective, even in his right hand. He put up with it for a few days, and grew to hate it so much he even thought about abandoning the whole sorry process and growing out an enormous beard. Those were _in_ , apparently, even though they struck him as being incredibly old-fashioned. Such things obviously went in circles. He wondered briefly if Darcy liked guys with beards, _Thor has a beard_. But in the end the itchiness and scruffiness - in light of his new haircut and clothes - frustrated him, to the point where he set about hunting down Erik’s razor for one last proper shave before he and Steve hit the road.

Bucky found the old-fashioned shaving kit in the cupboard easily, stored with other communal things rather than Erik’s personal stuff. But he knew it still wouldn’t be the same. Darcy was the reason that shaving wasn’t a chore, rather than this old razor. The more time he spent around her, the less he felt like a shattered fragment of a human being. So he ignored the little voice in his head telling him it was selfish, and knocked gently on Darcy’s door. He wordlessly held up the razor to her and she smirked at him, practically leaping off the bed.

This time, rather than pull through a chair for Darcy to stand on or having her perch on the sink, Bucky chose to sit on the edge of the bathtub and did it straight away. He saw Darcy notice and that she was trying to hide how she noticed. He took a steadying breath and held his chin up, waiting for her to start. There was still a slight whisper in the back of his head, simultaneously telling him to _lie back in the chair_ and that if he did it would hurt. He forced it down with the thought that if he laid back he’d tip backwards into the tub, and kept his eyes trained on Darcy.

The bubble of anxiety popped when he felt the lather on his jaw; part of him wanted to shut his eyes and relax, the other wanted to watch Darcy as long as he could. She worked more slowly than before, with a smile constantly tugging her at lips, like she was savouring the chance to stand close and touch him. And Bucky would be lying if he said he wasn’t lapping it up either. She turned his head a little to the side and started running the razor across his cheek. Even just the sight of the thing - not some curiously shaped chunk of plastic - made him feel better about the process. It was familiar. Although he was pretty sure he’d never had the privilege of having a beautiful woman do it for him, and not three times in one week. He liked to think he would remember that.

She took her time but it was still over far too soon for Bucky’s liking. Darcy ran her hands over his skin, his jaw, his cheek, ostensibly checking for any missed spots but enjoying it far more than necessary. She pursed her lips trying not to grin.

Bucky couldn’t remember the last time he’d kissed anyone, could barely remember the last time he’d thought about it. He didn’t know how he knew, but he just felt like this was a really good moment to kiss Darcy.

He brought his lips to meet hers and he revelled in the feel of it. A voice in his head screamed at him, what was he doing, Darcy was small and soft and would only be in danger associating with him. But he ignored it and it melted away because Darcy was small and soft and kissing him back. His left hand came up and the tips of his fingers ghosted over her cheek before he’d even thought about which hand it was. He’d never felt more human than this.

His right hand cupped her hip and his fingers drifted underneath the hem of her shirt, her skin was warm and silky. She raked her nails through the short hair at the back of his neck and he thought he might burst, the tattered remains of the last seventy years vanishing from thought. But very little Bucky did ever ran smoothly, and this was the moment Thor choose to poke his head through the half open bathroom door.

Thor gave a startled sort of groan and stopped short. And in an instant Darcy had whipped herself out of Bucky’s arms and rushed out of the bathroom, looking anywhere but at either Bucky or Thor.

“It’s occupied,” Bucky snapped, scowling at the God of Thunder who promptly turned on his heel and vanished.

Bucky fully expected an agonising punch to the face when Thor approached him later in the evening. But it did not come, rather Thor struggled to put into words exactly what it was he wanted to say and eventually blurted out, _“do not sully my bathroom with such acts again,”_ before leaving hurriedly with pink cheeks. Bucky knew he wasn’t talking about sitting on the bathtub but if Thor’s concern was more for the sanctity of his beloved bathroom than Bucky putting hands on Darcy, he could live with it.

Darcy had gone out with Jane, back under the stars, which had been their plan anyway, leaving Steve and Bucky to pack up their things. But Darcy had avoided looking directly at him the rest of the day and Bucky did not want to set off on the next leg of their journey and leave things awkward and unfinished. But he didn’t get his chance the next morning at breakfast, Steve and Thor talking animatedly about someone in town looking to sell their pick-up and how it would be much more practical for Steve and Bucky to have their own wheels to get around, at least until they got back to New York. The price was reasonable and truck in decent condition. Bucky didn’t hate the idea, he just didn’t really feel the need to contribute and kept glancing over, trying to catch Darcy’s eye. But Steve was continually asking him his opinion, right up until the moment he walked out the door with Thor to go and buy the damn thing.

Bucky thought for sure he’d find a moment to talk to Darcy in private now but Darcy threw herself deeply into processing the previous night’s data, never far from Jane’s side. It was perhaps a hint that she did not want to resolve whatever had started between them in the bathroom, maybe the kiss was just a kiss. Hell, he didn’t even know that she wasn’t seeing someone, hadn’t thought to ask. Logic said that she probably just wanted to forget about it and that he should move on. But something in his gut told him that it simply wasn’t true, though he would have struggled to articulate that even if he had gotten the chance. He gathered his things and Steve’s - his now amounting to a full backpack of clothes rather than a half-filled one - and set them just outside the large glass front doors of the showroom.

Erik, Darcy and Jane followed him out to say goodbye, mostly consisting of hand-shaking and mutual thanks for hospitality and manual labour, but before he could begin what was sure to be an awkward farewell to Darcy, he heard the tooting of a horn and Steve pulled up in a blue truck, which had a few dings in the side and a need for a thorough cleaning. Much in the same state Bucky had arrived in. Thor hopped out of the passenger side, leaving the door open for Bucky, and started loading up the meagre luggage into the back section of the cab.

“Don’t get into too much trouble while I’m gone,” Bucky muttered to Darcy, managing to make the first eye contact since their kiss, while he walked backwards towards the truck. Just as he turned away from her, he heard Darcy call back.

“How can I when you’re taking all the trouble with you?”

There was an instant flash in his brain; the memory of Steve, still all little, hugging him goodbye before he shipped out to war and the exact same feeling of not wanting to move another inch. He knew he couldn’t stay. He knew he couldn’t take Darcy with him. But he couldn’t just let this thing go. Darcy was so good. He wanted so badly to be able to come back, and have her waiting for him. But he’d never manage to put that into words any time this year, so he spun around and marched back. Before he could second-guess himself he cupped Darcy’s face in his hands and brought his lips crashing down onto hers. Darcy gripped the front of his jacket tight in her fists, pulling him towards her. He heard an awkward cough that sounded suspiciously like Jane.

He finally wrenched himself away to catch his breath but didn’t let go of Darcy, “I’ll catch you later, Doll. I promise.”

“Okay,” she breathed, reluctantly peeling herself from him. As he turned to get into the truck, with Steve smirking at him from behind the wheel, he saw Darcy take steadying breaths and trying to neaten her mussed up hair. He heard her whisper to Jane, calling her a hypocrite, and they drove off onto a long desert road. He knew Steve would never let him hear the end of it, but Bucky stared at Darcy in the wing mirror until she was completely out of sight.

 


End file.
